Tom Cary is The Telegraph's Formula One Correspondent. You can follow him on Twitter @tomcary_tel

What to make of the latest developments at McLaren and Red Bull?

It did not take long for the seemingly cordial relationship between McLaren team mates Jenson Button and Lewis Hamilton to hit the rocks (photo: ACTION IMAGES)

Curioser and curioser. What to make of the latest developments in the McLaren and Red Bull camps?

Firstly, from Woking, news that Lewis Hamilton was actually told by his race engineers in Turkey that Jenson Button would not try to overtake him (just moments before Button did)… no wonder Hamilton was looking so grouchy at the end of the race – he was taken completely by surprise.

There are a number of issues still to be resolved here. I am yet to hear a satisfactory explanation as to why Button claims he received no target lap times from the pitwall when McLaren's chief engineer Tim Goss told me quite categorically after the race that both drivers had been asked to conserve fuel and set 1:31 lap times…

Those twin instructions from the pitwall could clearly be construed as a coded message not to race, which is presumably how Hamilton took them even before he was told point blank that Button would not pass him.

Did the instructions not get through to Button? Did he not understand their meaning? Did he choose to ignore them??

McLaren claim that the incident was simply the result of miscommunication (with team orders banned in F1 they really have to tread on egg shells here) and that there was no attempt to undermine Hamilton by misleading him. I'm sure that is right. But if so, it was another botch-up from the team, and one which nearly resulted in an unnecessary collision (of the kind we had just seen with Red Bull) as a clearly startled Hamilton fought back and touched wheels with Button into T1. He should have been told, in answer to his question, that Button was free to race.

If not, and Button did receive a 'coded' message but chose to ignore it and just went for the overtaking move when it presented itself (Hamilton had just had a particularly poor T8, thus allowing Button to catch right up without needing to speed up significantly) then more power to Button's elbow. He is at McLaren to defend his world championship. If an overtaking opportunity arises without him having to break explicit team orders (which are, after all, illegal) then it is surely his right to take it.

As for Red Bull, they confirmed Mark Webber's new one-year contract extension on Monday. It was presumably agreed before the Turkish weekend. Do you think either party is regretting that agreement now? Webber because he saw in Istanbul that the team appeared to favour his team mate? Red Bull because they know a disgruntled Webber is a dangerous thing?

The contract announcement coincided with an interview given by Sebastain Vettel to the Beeb trotting out the party line once again that there is no team favouritism at Red Bull. "What we have been discussing internally is neither driver is favoured in any way," he said. "We go out and try to find out who is the better one, like it should be."

Once again, I'm sure that's right. Call me naive, but I do believe the team give both drivers equal opportunity – at least on track. I believe they felt Vettel was the faster driver in Turkey and wanted him to get past Webber before Hamilton caught them both. There are suggestions Horner ordered Webber's race engineer, Ciaran Pilbeam, to instruct the Australian to let the faster man through and that that instruction was not relayed to Webber. That does not imply Red Bull favour Vettel in general, merely that they did in this instance on the basis of technical data later shared with us.

Of course, this argument pre-supposes that all the data given to us was accurate; that Mark had been told to turn his engine revs down earlier; that his tyres were degrading faster than Vettel's; that the German still had an extra bit of fuel with which to make his move….

One thing is for sure, the agenda has already been set ahead of this weekend's Canadian Grand Prix. Red Bull and McLaren still have plenty of explaining to do.